Happy Mother's Day!

Dear Mom,

It is now officially Mother's Day in the US and therefore it is time for me to wish you a second and more official Happy Mother's Day.

If you were here I would take you for a walk to see all the lovely flowers that are out for spring.  Spring in the UK is truly beautiful.  This is not just because we are just way too excited to see the sun again. 

Seeing as you are still not here however, I will simply have to make do with sending you a few pictures of flowers.  So, here you have it, some flowers from a stroll around the UK.

These lovely pink flowers were blowing gently in a brisk Leeds wind.

I found them quite pretty.

Then I went for a stroll along the river in the adorable little town of Walton-on-Thames.  Spring had arrived there too and graced a lovely old Medieval House.

Spring here really is lovely.

I hope that you are enjoying this fine spring day and there are loads of pretty flowers for you.  Happy Mother's Day Mom.

I love you.

xxx
 

Breaking News: Mugger claims Scurvy made them do it!

Some day it will come to this.  One day I will hardly be able to fend off the scurvy and the madness and I will simply snap.  This will be my headline.  Mugger claims "Scurvy made me do it!"

I can tell you are confused.  That furrowed look on your brow, that raised eyebrow, that slightly narrowed eye tell all.  You cannot understand what I am talking about.  Well how could you?  YOU do not have scurvy.

At first I just thought I was tired from working too hard and maybe the tiniest bit lazy.  But then I realized the terrible truth.  I was in line to buy my handful of bargains at M&S when realization struck.  Out of all the things I could have selected to buy I had chosen to buy a lemon cake, a lemon mousse and a grapefruit.  I wasn't just tired and lazy.  I was craving fruit.  I had scurvy!  The hard yellow evidence was staring me straight in my scorbutic face.

Maybe the presence of this pirate cake alongside my lemon cake subconsciously started this whole thing? Nah, it was the scurvy.  Had to be.

Scorbutic, that's just such a great word.  No, focus Madder Hatter, you must stay focused.  Don't let the scurvy take you like this.

Ok, produce wallet, produce change, pay for citrusy products.  Almost safe.  No, the madness is taking over.  The scurvy... It. Is. Too. Powerful.

I stumbled back to my desk at work, delirious with laughter and the sickness.  I managed to obtain a spoon somehow in this state, peeled back the lid with trembling fingers and dug into the lemony mousse.  Ahhh.  The cure.  I could feel the sugary lemony goodness fixing me.  The madness slowly receded to a normal level and I went back to my work.  I had been saved from the scurvy, but not before I had realized my fate.

You see, it seems to be my fate to constantly battle scurvy.  I do not eat enough broccoli obviously, as I have explained before here.  So it is with a heavy heart that I must realize what my eventual fate will be.  I am destined to battle with scurvy my entire life.  Yes, tragic, but true.

I will not always be so lucky as to be within reach of a cure, however.  So, I am doomed to be the madman on the loose grasping at anything that even looks like a cure.

Mad with the scurvy I will scuttle down the street.  Nobody sitting at a quiet breakfast with grapefruit will be safe from my ravenous need for citrus.  I will be forced to grab lemony desserts from people's hands and down them without elegance or dignity.  Scorbutic hands trembling I am doomed to terrify the lone bearers of fruit flavoured cakes on public transportation.

With wild and anxious aspect I will spy the cakes from a distance, perched prettily on the lap of an unsuspecting bus passenger.  My desperate deficiency heightening my senses and screaming that I act now to restore my health, I will leap to my feet and race to my supposed salvation.  Muttering in demented demeanor aloud to myself about the scurvy I will pitch back and forth with the motion of the bus.  The scurvy will feel the motion, reach back into its ancient memory and believe with renewed audacity that it is afflicting a hapless sailor, demanding satisfaction in a fruit flavoured cake sacrifice to its honour.

I will battle with the scurvy.  I am a good person and won't want to take the poor passenger's cake.  But the scurvy will be strong and I will eventually be forced to steal their cake.  Unceremoniously, I will be found tearing into it to relieve my scurvy and become the world's weirdest and wildest mugger.  Stealing cakes from innocent people.  Once the scurvy has been sated and my sanity has returned to me it will be too late.  I will try to explain that the scurvy made me do it as I am led away in handcuffs for mugging some poor old lady bringing a lemon cake to her friends birthday.  But it will be too late she will already be terrified and traumatized by my public scorbutic debacle.

I am doomed.  Summer days may find me trying to pry orange popsicles from unsuspecting little fingers.  Fingers that will point me out as the orange-handed culprit.  Sure, sure I could have asked where they got their popsicles from, but scurvy doesn't heed logic.  Scurvy does not brook disappointment.  Scurvy is a law unto itself.  It is a bleak bleak future that awaits me.

Even if I try to stockpile on citrus products there is no telling when scurvy could strike.  I could be anywhere and nobody will be safe from my scorbutic mania.  Maybe I should get a lawyer.  Perhaps a good lawyer could explain that these innocent victims had knowledge of the whereabouts of the popsicle and cake vendors and that they were withholding that information from me.  I was forced to steal the popsicles and cakes out of great underprivileged need.

Or insanity.  The insanity plea could work.  The terrified lady from the bus could probably testify on my behalf even.  Insanity may just be my salvation. 

Mother's Day in March

It is after midnight so it is officially Mother's Day here in the UK.   Across the pond we celebrate Mother's Day on the second Sunday of May, but here it is celebrated on the fourth Sunday of Lent.  It just so happens that this year it is today, Sunday March 10th.  So, while I am not officially bound to celebrate Mother's Day today I think I shall anyway.  My mother is simply that great.  She deserves two whole days, not just one.

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers here who are celebrating officially and Happy Mother's Day to you Mom.  It seems that it is tradition to give your mother daffodils here in the UK, a fact which has been made difficult this year with the cold weather causing a shortage of the cheery yellow flowers.  And, well, it's a bit hard for me to give flowers to you anyway.  So, what I will do is amass some pictures of flowers for you.  This will be my way of saying extra thank you to you today.

Here are some British Daffodils for you.  Some from Grassington and some from Roundhay Park.

 

 

Now that I have given you these daffodils I have realized that flowers from England are not enough.  I need to travel the world to select the best and brightest flowers for your bouquet.  

Some of them I got to share with you in person, like these from Berkeley.

 Some flowers I had to travel further afield to find.  I had to go to Rome to find these for you.

Then I realized I was lacking some yellow flowers since those are your favorite. So I went to Geneva to get you some yellow tulips.

While I was there I picked up an iris for you because I think they are pretty and I wanted you to have one.

I then came home for a rest and found these yellow flowers amongst the ruins of Whitby Abbey.

The drive home from Whitby Abbey brought us along Robin Hood's Bay and I stopped to pick you these pretty purple wildflowers.  I think the view made them smell sweeter.

  Back in Leeds I picked these for you on campus and out in my favorite thinking place.

In Hebden Bridge I made sure roses grew on a trellis for you, lavender graced your windowsill and yellow flowers bloomed by your gate.

Then I went to Italy all the way out to Hadrian's Villa to pick you some lovely red poppies to give you a bit more colour variety.  

These yellow wildflowers next to the ancient ruined frescoes were too lovely to leave behind.  So I brought those home for you too.  After all it was you who taught me to see beauty in the tiny forgotten things.

While I was in the area I stopped over by Villa D'Este to get a few blooms for you.  They suited you too, happy and cheerful.  The sort of flowers that just remind me of you.

Speaking of tiny overlooked yet beautiful things, these poppies in Pompeii couldn't be appreciated better by anybody else.

Nor could the beauty of a vivid dragonfly against an orange flower.

 

And very few people would stop to admire the red hibiscus flowers that dropped red petals on red tiles next to this red bench in the heart of Benalmadena, Spain.  But I know you would.

Finally I made one last stop.  I went to Paris to find you the last most necessary flowers.  I needed to find you some lilacs and I did find them in this garden.

While I was there I also found yellow flowers dripping with rain, so delicate and lovely...

 and a glass flower.  I brought them along too because I know how strong you are and sometimes I forget that you are also fragile.  I didn't want to forget so I added them to my bouquet for you. 

 

I know I haven't always been nearby and we haven't always been able to share all our adventures together.  But I want you to know that you have always been close to my heart.

Happy Mother's Day Mom.  I love you.

xxx

Worst View in the World?

Now typically I like to talk about the pretty things when I write.  I'd much rather think on the brighter side than dwell on the darker side of things.  But, every so often, a girl simply must admit to the stark realities of life.  One of those unavoidable realities, an unpleasantly true fact, is that I have one of the ugliest views in the world.

You see I live in Leeds, not the prettiest city in the world.  Sorry Leeds, you must remember that I first met you just after the bin collectors' strike, so the bar for ugly sites has been set rather high.  That being the case, what is it that makes my view so terrible?  Well, for a start I look out at an alley full of rubbish bins.

Ok, you may be thinking to yourself, rubbish bins?  Everybody has to look at rubbish bins.  There is nothing unusually ugly about that.

AND the neighbor children play football in the alley and frequently knock over the bins, strewing their contents about the alley.

Hmm, ok, maybe slightly worse.

AND there is a construction project going on across the way.

Well, again, you think to yourself that it can't be all that bad.

You may be right, the construction isn't so much the issue as the pace at which it is being completed.  It is halted every time it rains.  Hello!  We live in England!  It's ALWAYS raining!  So, I have the sneaking suspicion that the pile of rubbish and construction supplies will never actually disappear.

The bin collectors have just come and gone so it almost looks decent for the moment.

Ok, so it's not the best view in the world, but what makes it the worst?

I just love heaps of construction waste, don't you?

The real sign that it's the worst view in the world has nothing to do with the construction or rubbish.  The test for ugly views is far more random and simplistic.  You know how everything looks better when it snows?  Well, I am here to tell you that my view isn't even improved by a snow.  And if a healthy coating of beautiful white snow can't even make my view pretty then nothing can.

I've seen bins that look exciting and almost fun in the snow, with giant domes of snow crowning them and making them not only funny but also somehow attractive for once in their lives.  Normally ugly shapes are suddenly interesting and lovely with some snow.  I've seen car parks (or parking lots) that by any normal standard would be judged a blight, that were transformed into a beautiful scene by snow.  Snow is the ultimate beautifier, yes, I just made that word up, and if snow can't fix a view then it's hopeless.

My view therefore fails the snow beauty test.  My view is ugly.  No it's worse than that; it's heinous.  My view is quite possibly one of the worst views in the world.  It is certainly the worst view I've ever had.

So, I have decided to enter the Worst Window View Competition by Wooden Blinds Direct to see how my abhorrent view compares to others.  Maybe I will be surprised, realise my view isn't all that bad, and come away heartened by the fact that my view could be decidedly worse.  Or maybe I will win a Kindle Fire HD.  It is a competition I cannot actually lose.

I didn't think I'd ever have occasion to say this, but I am actually looking forward to seeing the worst views the world has to offer. 

The Importance of Art

Purple flower as found in one of Geneva's parks two Easters ago.

Art, true art, is possibly the most important thing in the world.  Cicero once defended it in a lengthy speech and while I am not a huge fan of Cicero I have to agree with him that art is important.  You see, I believe that no matter how bad things get, no matter how sad you are, no matter how hard it is to carry on carrying on, if you listen to a beautiful song, look at a beautiful picture and read a beautiful story a little piece of your soul will be restored.

I myself have been having a rough time the last few weeks and I have decided to combat this with art.  I go through pinterest and pin all the pretty things I find.  I marvel at nature and absorb the splendid colours and get lost in the beauty of places I long to visit.  It reminds me that there is more to see in this world and it inspires me to start planning to see it.

Looking at things like this calms me down.   And doesn't this just feel all peaceful?

Then I listen to some beautiful songs.  Some of them have no words, they just are.  They perfectly express how I feel and sometimes they bring tears to my eyes that I have been suppressing for too long.  Some of these songs have words and it reminds me that I am not alone.  Other people have felt my pain.  It makes me feel connected to the human race again, and just the smallest bit more alive.  Sadness is also part of life.

Then I read a beautiful story.  And like all good stories it transports me out of my world for just a moment.  It makes me feel different things and think about different problems.  It makes me curious about what comes next and it reminds that there is hope.  Even the saddest stories can have a good ending.  Life is not static.  Whatever it is that is bothering you now and dragging you down cannot last forever.  It too will pass.  Hold on for that brighter future.

Life without art would truly be a sad place.  For how else are we meant to express those inexpressible things, those deep inner feelings and thoughts, those terribly important and weighty truths of life?  Without art in the world I think I would be truly lost.

My bookshelf may actually define me

The other day I was strolling aimlessly along the streets, alleys and byways of the unfathomable internet when I came across a blog.  Gasp, how unusual.  Ok, perhaps not, but the post I found there did strike me as unusual.  It was a post about what your bookshelf says about you.  And that made me pause as I have always believed that a good poke around somebody's bookshelves can be highly instructive.

So, I stopped my aimless wandering about on the internet to read the post by Mayfair Mum.  As it turns out this post was part of a blog hop where several other bloggers also wrote about the content of their bookshelves and what it said about them. 

Over the past several days I have kept returning to this idea.  What do my books say about me?  Interestingly enough, I have come to the conclusion that they say a lot more about me than I had ever realized.

For a start I have been trying very hard to drastically limit the amount of books I accumulate.  I am not sure how long I will be living here in this house and if I'm perfectly honest in this country.  My life is all a bit vague in the plans area and I certainly feel the transience keenly.  So I have been limiting my book buying habits partly out of a sense of impermanence and the desire to not move them all about, and partly out of a sense of stubborn duty to hold myself to a strict book buying budget.

Minus the copy of Boccaccio's Decameron that I keep for flying (short stories are best for travel I think), these are all the books I have with me at the moment.  Not many at all, but still more than I'd like to move about.

If I didn't impose this budget and limit on myself I'd probably be drowning in books by now.  You see, I grew up in a household full of books.  My mother reads, and my father, well, he devours books.  He is constantly reading.  Reading was only interrupted by noisy children (I was one of them) and napping (he insisted he was checking for light leaks).  The rate of massive book consumption that ensued filled our house with over 2,000 books.  How do I know this?  Because my brother and I counted one summer.  A completely daft project only exceeded in silliness by his idea to alphabetize all our books.  The madness.  Anyhooo.

That was several years ago and by now I am not sure how many more there are.  Books never leave our family house.  We simply, buy, build and improvise more bookshelves for them.  So, I feel the absence of piles of books rather keenly and the small number I have at the moment points to my feelings of transience and my stubborn will to be logical and not overly indulge one of my pastimes. 

On to the books themselves.  My reading habits seem to be thematic.  There are books about love, no, not romance novels, just books that fall into the chick lit genre.  Modern women dealing with issues of family, friends, career and of course the inevitable sub plot of romance.  Books like the Little Lady Agency by Hester Brown, and The Finishing Touches.

Next on my list of must reads.

I suppose I am typical in this regard and like to read stories where the romantic issues all get sorted out nicely in the end and the couple you know belongs together ends up together.  Plus it is refreshing to read stories with strong female characters that live in a modern world that necessitates the holding down of jobs.

Then I also tend to read books that have a touch of history in them.  Sometimes they are full-blown historical fiction.  Sometimes they are only loosely based on a former time.  Sometimes, like the Glassblower of Murano by Marina Fiorato, they flick constantly between the Renaissance and modern times.

Excellent book, fascinatingly woven together.

I guess that just shows that I really do have an historian's soul.  I can't get enough of history, not even in my pleasure reading.

Moving Target by Elizabeth Lowell is the book that seems least related to my other reading choices.  It happens to be a bit about love and illuminated manuscripts, so it does fall into both my categories as well as being slightly suspenseful.

I read books that are aimed at young adults such as The Boyfriend List by E. Lockhart.  Because there are days that I've had to think too hard about way too many adult things and I just want to sit back and revel in easy fun reads.  I read books that are serious and also true, like My Dancing White Horses by Alois Podhajsky.  It is his autobiography and the story of the Lipizzaner's and the Spanish Riding School in Vienna during WWII.

I do not have much in the way of fantasy on my shelf at the moment.  This may be due to the fact that I'm more selective about my fantasy books.  I don't like them simply because they are fantasy.  I do like dragons, but that does not excuse poor writing.  I like the idea of magic but I also like well developed characters. I'm just picky.  That's not to say that I don't enjoy them though.  Howl's Moving Castle is one of my favorite books.   

So, really I think my bookcases tells you where I am in life.  Despite my logical maneuverings to keep my book habit in check I still have a number of books hanging about.  I need them to escape.  And I escape by reading about strong women who get things together and find love and happy endings.  And I read about history.  Being a historian, I think everybody needs to escape the modern age every now and then.  

I suppose the real question is what does your bookcase say about you?  Join this interesting blog hop and let us know, or simply have a quick read of what some other people think their books say about them.